


Smoke

by UnpredictableEasty



Category: Original Work
Genre: Denial, Grief, Indian funeral customs, Pre story death, Tentative acceptance, Transphobia, death of father, transgender character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-23
Updated: 2020-05-23
Packaged: 2021-03-03 05:22:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,014
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24339580
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/UnpredictableEasty/pseuds/UnpredictableEasty
Summary: Death is a struggle but in between her relatives, she has more struggles to face.
Comments: 1
Kudos: 8





	Smoke

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first try writing a tranwoman and I hope that I did justice here.

Death is always fresh, it’s ironic considering how it always brings decay.

A few years ago when she had been a different person,it was a different death. She had pulled through all stages of loss, she had thought that she was done. She saw death and it could not scare her, could not make her feel like a life had ended; which had nothing to do with the body lying encased in white.

Or perhaps it had everything to do with it.

She did not think that she would feel the crushing defeat against life like that again. She had never realised that Death always donned new attire with pressed seams to greet the living while it took the dead.

Modern medicines were not helpful. She thought bitterly about the stories, shows, cliched moments where the heart monitor would show the straight line and the news would be final. In reality, it was worse. The supposed angels in white would tell you worse, give you a horrible package wrapped up in a simple sentence. They would talk about brain functions and give you hope.

She didn’t know which was worse, if you are aware of time, the light in the horizon can be a new dawn or it can be dusk, harbinger of darkness.

She never could see the sunset again without hating the cruel hope it brought. Even though the duration of that glow had been for ten minutes but the same assault to her heart was fresh when it  strode upon the last vestiges of whatever remained in her chest.

Suddenly he was no longer a patient, not even just a body, he was cadaver. Her father was a good man, they had known this would happen. It surprised her how inevitable things hurt the most. 

***************************************************

It was at 6:23 AM, on 26 August, she lost hope and her dad. It was 12:06 PM, she got whatever was left of his body. She had a hysterical thought that it was much more than what she  had imagined. Was she insensitive to think that science would grab every little limb of her father with its vicious talons? She had no answer, nor did she care for it when her father’s body was delivered.

She stood beside her stormy faced mother as the body was brought to the front room, laid in the middle. She felt like something was missing. There was the body, her father, there were people, there was crying, there were a hundred different rituals and there was…….

A blanket.

An invisible  blanket surrounded her, everything filtered through but muffled by the barrier. She needed to feel the death, she needed to cry, she needed to wring every last shred of strength in herself and become empty. 

Though in the end the only thing she felt was horrible. She was a horrible daughter that couldn’t even cry. All she could think about was to do all the  tasks  in front  of her, of getting all the guests out of her home, her family’s home. She wanted to be alone but that was not going to happen. There were things to be done and it was her responsibility.

Her mother had already gone inside and it fell on the male members of the family to dress the body. She knew she couldn’t escape from this. They did not understand how she was a girl, that biology had fucked her up, that she may look like a male but she would remain a girl in soul. 

“ _ Daksh _ ” Her uncle said.

He was a thin man with a wispy moustache, his eyelids were always hooded as if he was on the verge of sleeping. That was a facade though. Nobody was as alert as him. It was a proof of his alertness that he could see her fleeing before she even made the decision.

“ _ I hope at this time of death, you would be done with this charade. _ ” His nasally voice was flat but it left an echo on her mind, vibrating against the inside of her brain.

She wanted to protest, to yell at this unfair statement but her body stayed unresponsive, her head bowed, her eyes lowered but perhaps worse, her eyes dry. Was it the proof that she didn’t care for her father, that she cared for only herself. She would not be surprised, she could have lived a normal life, acting as the gender that had been given to her, her family wouldn’t have had so many fights if not for her selfishness. But no, she didn’t want to live like that and she had let it all happen.

She wondered if all of this was her fault. Her actions may have weighed on her father’s heart.

But no, he had supported her, a paragon of modern thinking in a small city. He had listened to her and researched it himself,  had asked her questions and he had, most of all, accepted her as she was. 

Her mother was a dutiful wife. If they fought about this topic, it was not  in front of her. The elder woman always said that discontent between spouses should be between them, not an entertainment  for the outer world.So they had never fought outside of their own room, not even she had heard any yell of frustration or anger but there was one thing clear to her, her mother did not accept her father’s view.

* * *

As the smoke curled  in front of her, she thought about the smoke of the pyre. She thought how her Dad would react to her smoking like this, hunched in a corner, hiding from family. There was a pebble underneath her that was a constant source of pain for her. The pain was good, it distracted her from more painful memories. She dug her thumbnail in her index finger nail to take out the dirt under it, another bad habit her dad wanted her to leave. She pressed it a bit harder and felt better when she felt the twinge that meant the nail had pierced the sensitive skin under it. She exhaled the smoke while watching a thin line of blood spreading and pressed on it to feel the pain again.

The image of the pyre burned in her mind as the cigarette slowly burned her own lungs. There was poetry behind it perhaps, the fire, the smoke, the choking feeling in her throat because of it. His father would have written something good about it, he had a way with words. She hardly had any of his personality, her mother’s genes dominated her. From looks to personal traits, she was her mother through and through. There was only one thing that her father bestowed on her, to be curious, to not contain herself in one space.

It was while she rested her head against the wall and watched the stars shine, when her uncle descended on her. There were two other relatives of hers. His uncle Govardhan, who had scolded her just this morning about her ‘charades’ had said a few more things to her about the proper behaviour for a man. He had brought uncle Surya and uncle Farid with him.

Uncle Surya was her maternal uncle while Uncle Farid was an almost brother to her father. Govardhan uncle got along with Farid uncle famously, they made a trio with her father. A trio of whom only two people remained now.

“ _Daksh_ baba _, what are you doing here? Your mother is looking for you._ ” Uncle Farid said.

Before I could respond, the nasal voice of my uncle interrupted me.

“ _ You’re smoking? _ ” He asked.

Instead of raising her eyebrows like she wanted to do, she tried to look ashamed.

“ _ Girls don’t smoke _ .” 

The words had no emotions behind it, uttered without an inflection or judgement. She felt shocked hearing them and perhaps for a minute a hope flared inside her. 

Suddenly the wispy moustache twitched and a smile shined on his face.

“ _ I told you that you’re a man. Smoking is for guys after all. _ ” A wink was sent her way and she tried not to send a grimace of her own to him.

“ _ Dhano, don’t start that topic right now. _ ” Uncle Farid said.

His kind face was frowning at the moment and his forehead creased with worry lines. Her uncle twitched at the infamous nickname but didn’t give it much thought. She imagined that he would have gotten used to it by now.

“ _ There is no topic to discuss, I am just trying to dissolve any future drama before it could begin. _ ” 

“ _ There will be no drama, it’s a funeral, not a movie set. _ ” Uncle Surya said, glaring at her other uncle. 

It was no secret that both her uncles were not good friends, why they have decided to hang around together was a secret to her.

“ _ No drama indeed! _ ” Uncle Farid said and slapped both of their shoulders. She saw as he squeezed both their shoulders in warning.

“ _ As I said, your mother is looking for you, go find her. _ ” He continued.

She passed them, squeezing between her two glaring uncles,almost  running to the inside of her house.

“ _ Where have you been? _ ” Her mother’s formidable figure was standing near the kitchen, the light coming through her bathing her left side in light while the right side remained in the dark. The gallery beside the kitchen used to have a light bulb but it has been too long since it was needed by anyone and so it remained dark there.

It was still a shock to see all in white. She was not big on  makeup or getting ready. Her parents preferred simple attires over gaudy materials but still she was known for her colourful  _ sarees _ . She was still the same, her face was set in stone, she had cried in  the beginning , letting a few tears roll through her cheeks but after that she had been silent. Her expressions fixed in a stern expression, mouth pressed tightly and somehow she knew that her mother was stopping herself from crying. 

Right now she had anger written on her face and she wondered what she had done now. 

_ “What happened, ma?”  _

_ “Were you smoking?”  _

Strong nose was definitely something that she had inherited from her mother, but right now she wished that it was not so. 

_ “Sorry” _ There was no need to confirm or deny the question.

_ “The day after tomorrow you will have so many things to do and instead of learning about them, you are smoking in a corner?”  _

They will be having  _ Uthavni _ on that day. She knew that preparations were to be done for it, she felt guilty for trying to escape from her responsibilities. Looking at her mother, she resolved to put in more effort.

_ “I will go and start preparing with uncles.”  _

As she moved to go outside again, her mother stopped her by holding her arm.

_ “Go and talk to your cousin sisters, ask them how to prepare rice and daal.” _ She said, her eyes were on the plant that had its home on the wall opposite the kitchen.

“ _ What?”  _

She didn’t understand. She knew by custom that it was the duty of the daughters of the house to prepare lunch on the day of  _ Uthavni _ while everyone else went and attended it. Her duty would probably consist of calling her relatives and organising the whole thing. 

Her mother kept staring at the plant as she continued.

_ “You were a son to me but you were a daughter to your father and a daughter you will remain for him. Perhaps I will see what your father saw but for now we will do things according to his wishes. Go learn how to make lunch and then go outside and take charge of the event.” _

Her mother released her hand and walked away. She stayed standing, wondering, hoping, a feeling clawing its way through her chest to her throat. She could only run and hide and sob as she replayed her mother’s words again and again. 

  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Reviews please!!!


End file.
